[Haskell-beginners] Top beginner mistakes

[Francesco Bochicchio]

2009/3/4 7stud <bbxx789_05ss at yahoo.com>

> Here are my top three:
>
> ...




>
> 3) Not putting parentheses around arguments of the form x:xs
>
> dosomething x:xs = head xs
>
>
>
I have a variation here:

function [] = ...
function [x:xs] = ...

Another of mine is the classical:

print function arguments -- or variations

but I finally learned to use '$' here .



>
>
> In all three cases, the error messages don't help spot the problem.
>
>
> I think that part of the problem  is that haskell syntax is powerful but
terse, and therefore is not easy for a compiler to guess the intensions in
the programmers.
For instance, in any other language the expression 'map f'  would give the
error "missing second parameter",  while in haskell could be a partial
function application.

However, some of ghc messages could probably  be made more
'beginners-friendly'.

Ciao
---------
FB
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